--- In [email protected], "Mark Day" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Q: Why are videobloggers like mainstream media executives? > > A: They both look down on people who post videos on YouTube. > > Actually, that's unfair. To mainstream media executives (ba - dum - bing!) > > It's funny, as we like to say in comedy, because it's true. > > Just some food for thought. > > Cheers > > Mark Day > http://markdaycomedy.blip.tv > http://www.youtube.com/markdaycomedy > http://www.myspace.com/markday
For the most part, I agree with your generalization. Of course generalizations don't apply to everyone and perhaps not even most people, though one could gather from the conversations that go on in this group that you would be correct. YouTube is a vehicle... an arena. Nothing more and nothing less. There are people that have technical issues with YT and complain that they're a closed environment. That really doesn't have anything to do with the posters, because it's not their choice. They're not the management. YouTube just happens to be an easy way to put video on the internet and distribute that video to a lot of people, practically immediately, and TOTALLY for free (assuming you already have the computer equipment / camera). Unfortunately, the same thing that makes YT easy to get involved with makes it a source of endless buffoonery. The signal/noise ratio is outlandish. Unfortunately for the prospect of YT being 'accepted' outside of its own walls (not that it needs acceptance at all), there's so much garbage on it that it's not likely that the casual observer coming into contact with YT by accident is going to see something that endears them to the site. Well... Unless you count the fact that there' so much pirated material on YT, but that's not what this discussion is about. Hopefully, with the successes of "shows" like Lonelygirl15 and LisaNova, the YT environment will evolve into more than sending video chats back and forth and making comments about them. I think that's a really valuable use for YT, but the opportunity is there for the same people to apply themselves creatively and develop their abilities at broadcasting and communication, if that's what their goals are. For some people, it's just easier to make videos and watch them online than go to the mall and meet people, so that's what they do. Yes, there are people developing characters and creating situations to portray them in and making up comedy skits and stop-motion videos and all kinds of interesting, intelligent, progressive and VERY TALENTED stuff. Unfortunately, there's no way to find those except for trial & error. In 'defending' what's creative about YT, you also have to defend what isn't creative, because there's no distinction. There are director accounts, but that doesn't mean that those channels have been held to any standard of quality, content-wise or production-value-wise. It's like saying someone's a good basketball player because they're on the varsity team, but you don't mention that they ride the bench and never set foot on the basketball court. :) They get to wear the jacket, though. Everyone on YT is wearing the same jacket. Meanwhile, you have people learning to put video on the internet out in the wild. No walled garden. No guaranteed visibility. No social network to ping-pong your video around causing more views. No "video response" so you can automatically piggyback on a video that gets viewed literally a million times. No ability to leech off of the top subscribed people/groups in the community just by mentioning their names in the titles of your videos. No arbitrarily decided "featuring" of your video....... There's going to be a certain amount of "looking down upon" by people who are doing MORE towards people who are doing LESS. It's just natural. MLB players look down on AAA players. AAA players look down on little league players. World Cup soccer players look down on the local American teams. NFL players look down upon CFL players. People making movies in Hollywood look down on independent filmmakers without the budget even to get someone to score their film properly. Does this mean that CFL players can't make it to the NFL? No. It doesn't mean that independent filmmakers aren't going to make it to Hollywood or make a film that has more value and integrity than films currently being produced in Hollywood. There's no doubt that there's SOME quality on YouTube. :) The problem is that without the ability to separate the "YT Elite" from the garbage, all of youse have to stand together when someone chooses to evaluate the site as a whole. When someone posts a video of some lady slipping on a banana peel and gets 100,000 views for that on YouTube, that doesn't make them a good filmmaker. If they stole the video from somewhere else, they're less than that. There's no regulation and no quality control. It's like having your GED <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GED>. Basically, you can opt-out of High School and take a test. If you pass that test, the government will agree that you have enough knowledge that you WOULD HAVE graduated High School if you had bothered (or been able, in some circumstances) to go. :D Are people with GEDs looked down upon? Yep. Does it mean they can't do the job you're hiring for? Nope. They might be the best applicant for the position. However, they're still going to be categorized with alllllll the rest of the people that walked through the doors of the emploment office with evidence that they passed one test on one day instead of going to High School and graduating like everyone else. Even if you dropped out of High School to get a job to help your mother pay the rent, you're going to be stigmatized along with the kids that spent all day smoking pot and ditching class..... Same thing with YouTube. -- Bill C. http://ReelSolid.TV
